She gave birth-finally!

[AdoraBelle Dearheart]

And, what if I use RO water for now instead of treating the water with chemical? Will that be okay? Or should I be concerned that all the fries would turn out female? Since I heard that RO water is soft and...soft water is reluctant to give us gonopodiums?

Don't use RO, because it's soft water. Not about the development, but guppies are a hardwater fish - they've evolved to live in hard water with all the mineral content it contains, and over the long term, would struggle and fail in RO water.

Is a basic water conditioner not available where you live? As a forum on the whole, we don't like using too many chemicals in our tanks, but water conditioner is an exception since tapwater nearly everywhere is treated with chlorine to make it safe for humans to drink, and the chlorine is toxic to fish. API water conditioner and Seachem Prime are excellent brands that make the water safe, without a ton of extra chemicals or additives like aloe vera.

What water are you using for them at the moment?

Three gallons is on the small side... and any size container is a potential problem without a filter, since it's uncycled. You'll want to be doing large daily water changes on an unfiltered 3 gallon with fish in it, but large water changes with water containing chlorine is also a danger... You really need to think about your set up - especially with more and more fry coming. Where and how to house them all while they grow, and how to keep the tanks cycled and low in nitrates for them to be safe and healthy.

Are you relatively new to fishkeeping? Do you know what the cycle is? Not asking to be mean! Just want to help, so need to know what knowledge you need to keep the fish happy and healthy!

 

[Red15]

Don't use RO, because it's soft water. Not about the development, but guppies are a hardwater fish - they've evolved to live in hard water with all the mineral content it contains, and over the long term, would struggle and fail in RO water.

Is a basic water conditioner not available where you live? As a forum on the whole, we don't like using too many chemicals in our tanks, but water conditioner is an exception since tapwater nearly everywhere is treated with chlorine to make it safe for humans to drink, and the chlorine is toxic to fish. API water conditioner and Seachem Prime are excellent brands that make the water safe, without a ton of extra chemicals or additives like aloe vera.

What water are you using for them at the moment?

Three gallons is on the small side... and any size container is a potential problem without a filter, since it's uncycled. You'll want to be doing large daily water changes on an unfiltered 3 gallon with fish in it, but large water changes with water containing chlorine is also a danger... You really need to think about your set up - especially with more and more fry coming. Where and how to house them all while they grow, and how to keep the tanks cycled and low in nitrates for them to be safe and healthy.

Are you relatively new to fishkeeping? Do you know what the cycle is? Not asking to be mean! Just want to help, so need to know what knowledge you need to keep the fish happy and healthy!

Yep,I am new to fish keeping, nearly one year now. But yeah I do know what cycling is for the sake of my half a year of studying about the hobby in google and watching hundreds of videos before I came in the hobby.
Generally, I leave water for a few days before using it in my tank but I've just learnt two days ago that it isn't enough. So I'm getting a water conditioner as soon as I can.
And I know that guppies are hard water fishes but I didn't think RO water would be that problematic.
I have filters in fry tanks-the 3 gallon ones, I also run 30-60% water changes in them every weekend, and as I said, I would probably move the new fries with the 2 weeks old ones so that I don't have to buy another.
Though at the rate I'm getting fries, I know I have to get a real tank now and with bigger capacity.
Thanks for the concern!

 

[AdoraBelle Dearheart]

Yep,I am new to fish keeping, nearly one year now. But yeah I do know what cycling is for the sake of my half a year of studying about the hobby in google and watching hundreds of videos before I came in the hobby.
Generally, I leave water for a few days before using it in my tank but I've just learnt two days ago that it isn't enough. So I'm getting a water conditioner as soon as I can.
And I know that guppies are hard water fishes but I didn't think RO water would be that problematic.
I have filters in fry tanks-the 3 gallon ones, I also run 30-60% water changes in them every weekend, and as I said, I would probably move the new fries with the 2 weeks old ones so that I don't have to buy another.
Though at the rate I'm getting fries, I know I have to get a real tank now and with bigger capacity.
Thanks for the concern!

Ah that's good, no worries! Welcome to the hobby Just wanted to help. I know from experience how overwhelming the number of livebearers can get, very fast! I'd only planned to have a little tank with some guppies when I started, thinking the adults would probably eat most of the fry - but my adults never seemed to touch them, so very quickly had to change my plans and get a 2nd tank, and then a 3rd and 4th! lol

Personally I'd up the water changes to 70% 2-3 times per week on the 3 gallons if possible, once you have the water conditioner. At least with the small tanks, water changes don't take long to do

Yeah, RO water is great for softwater fish (but even then I think it needs some degree of re-mineralising before use, but I might be wrong there), but for hardwater fish like guppies and mollies (mollies especially need a GH of 250ppm or more) they really need hard water, and some soft water fish really need very soft water. All about how their bodies process and store the mineral content in the water.

A lot of the science there is above my head, @Essjay is our resident wise chemist who could answer other questions about hardness or water conditioners I'm sure! She taught me about the relevance of GH in fishkeeping. It's not an area many of places cover much, oddly, beyond mentioning hardness range and pH, which a lot of people ignore or don't understand. I'd done a lot of reading around and youtube watching before setting up my tank too, but hadn't seen anything talking about the effects of soft or hard water on different species before coming here. Glad that I learned though, since I had a mix of soft and hardwater fish at the time. My tapwater is hard, so I have mainly hardwater fish tanks, and one smaller tank where I soften the water for the species in there.

Do you happen to know the GH, KH and pH of your source water? It's listed on some water suppliers websites.

 

[Red15]

Ah that's good, no worries! Welcome to the hobby Just wanted to help. I know from experience how overwhelming the number of livebearers can get, very fast! I'd only planned to have a little tank with some guppies when I started, thinking the adults would probably eat most of the fry - but my adults never seemed to touch them, so very quickly had to change my plans and get a 2nd tank, and then a 3rd and 4th! lol

Personally I'd up the water changes to 70% 2-3 times per week on the 3 gallons if possible, once you have the water conditioner. At least with the small tanks, water changes don't take long to do

Yeah, RO water is great for softwater fish (but even then I think it needs some degree of re-mineralising before use, but I might be wrong there), but for hardwater fish like guppies and mollies (mollies especially need a GH of 250ppm or more) they really need hard water, and some soft water fish really need very soft water. All about how their bodies process and store the mineral content in the water.

A lot of the science there is above my head, @Essjay is our resident wise chemist who could answer other questions about hardness or water conditioners I'm sure! She taught me about the relevance of GH in fishkeeping. It's not an area many of places cover much, oddly, beyond mentioning hardness range and pH, which a lot of people ignore or don't understand. I'd done a lot of reading around and youtube watching before setting up my tank too, but hadn't seen anything talking about the effects of soft or hard water on different species before coming here. Glad that I learned though, since I had a mix of soft and hardwater fish at the time. My tapwater is hard, so I have mainly hardwater fish tanks, and one smaller tank where I soften the water for the species in there.

Do you happen to know the GH, KH and pH of your source water? It's listed on some water suppliers websites.

To speak of the truth, I'm really thankful that all of you are so helpful and passionate about the hobby, it amazes me how much you care about other people's fishes and matters circling that.
Unfortunately, I'm not aware of any of the terms you've mentioned. But I do have heard that the water is my area is mostly on the hard side.

 

[Essjay]

Do you get limescale (white crusting) in your kettle or on your shower head? That indicates hard water. I have soft water and we don't get any limescale build up.

Guppies are hard water fish so they need the minerals that are in hard water. RO removes all the minerals making it very very soft which is not good for guppies or other hard water fish - they need those minerals. If you use RO water for guppies and other hard water fish you would need to add Rift Lake salts to make the RO enough.

 

[Red15]

Do you get limescale (white crusting) in your kettle or on your shower head? That indicates hard water. I have soft water and we don't get any limescale build up.

Guppies are hard water fish so they need the minerals that are in hard water. RO removes all the minerals making it very very soft which is not good for guppies or other hard water fish - they need those minerals. If you use RO water for guppies and other hard water fish you would need to add Rift Lake salts to make the RO enough.

Yes, we do get limescale as you've mentioned.

 

[StripySnailGirl04]

@Red15 It would be interesting if you made a separate thread about older fry that you mentioned from older batches. Pictures would be good. Perhaps a journal of their growth.